16/4/2017, A referendum in Turkey was
narrowly won by President
Erdogan, with 51.3% of the vote. The victory gave him wider powers.

31/12/2016, A nightclub in Istanbul
packed with New Year’s Eve revellers was attacked by a gunman who killed 39 and
injured 69.

19/12/2016, The Russian Ambassador to
Turkey was shot dead in an art gallery in Ankara by an Islamist gunman in
revenge for the Russian intervention to support pro-Assad forces in Syria.
Turkey was in opposition to the Russian policy in Syria, being very anti-Assad.

10/12/2016, An explosion at a football
match in Istanbul killed 35 people and injured 155. Kurdish militants were
blamed.

15/7/2016, A military coup began in
Turkey.The
military wanted to preserve the secular nature of Turkey and were against the
Islamist policies of President Erdogan. However by 16/7/2016 the
coup had failed, with 161 dead, over 1,400 injured and some 3,000 arrested.

24/11/2015, Turkey shot down a Russian
jet fighter that was taking part in Russia’s pro-Assad campaign in Syria,
against both ISIS and non-ISIS rebels. Turkey said the aircraft had
transgressed into Turkish airspace, and was warned several times. Russia denied
the warnings, and it appeared the jet had at most been in Turkish airspace for
2 or 3 seconds as it (might have) crossed a finger of Turkish territory jutting
into Syria.

5/7/2015, A referendum in Greece
solidly rejected the austerity measures demanded by the IMF and Brussels as a
condition of further loans to Greece to rescue its economy. However these
measures were largely implemented after the Greek banks and stock exchange
closed and drastic limits were imposed on cashpoint withdrawals.

25/1/2015, In Greece the Left-Wing
populist party Syriza, led by Alexis Tsipras,
won the elections. Greece was suffering the effects of an austerity programme
having gone through a major recession and owing massive debts to the EU. Syriza
now threatened to default on Greece’s repayment schedule, much to the
consternation of Germany. Greek debts in 2015 amounted to 175% of its GDP, with
25% unemployment.

29/10/2014, 150 Kurdish fighters set
off from Erbil (Kurdish Iraq) to travel throughTurkish territory to reinforce Kurdish fighters across the Turkish-Syria
border battling ISIS in the Syrian border town of Kobani. ISIS began to lose
ground there, as Syrian Kurds were reinforced by US arms drops and US air
strikes against ISIS. The fight for Kobani assumed increased importance as the
global TV media focussed on the battle from just across the border in Turkey.
The issue of Turkey allowing Kurdish reinforcements across its territory was
sensitive because Turkey has its own Kurdish minority region in the south-east.

2013, The European Court of Human Rights demanded
that Turkey pay Euro 90 million compensation in damages to Greek Cypriots.
Turkey refused to comply.

31/5/2013, Turkish police burnt down
a protestors camp in Gezi Park, Istanbul.
The protests were against plans to redevelop the park, one of the few green
spaces in the city, for commercial uses.

16/3/2013, To rescue its banks, Cyprus announced a plan that would confiscate the savings of its biggest
depositors.

27/10/2011, An
emergency meeting in Brussels concerning the Greek Debt Crisis.A
writedown of 50% of Greek bonds was agreed, recapitalisation of European banks,
and an increase in the bailout fund of the European Financial Stability
facility.

2/5/2010, The
EU and the IMF agreed a Euro 110 billion bailout for Greece; Greece would adopt
austerity measures.

6/12/2008, Rioting in Greece after
Greek police shot a 15 year old in the head, killing him.

2006,
Talks on Turkey joining the EU broke down over the northern Cyprus issue.

2004,
Cyprus (southern Greek portion) joined the EU.

2003, Mr Recep Tayyip Erdogan of the AK Party
became President in Turkey.

20/11/2003, Suicide bombers struck
again in Istanbul at the British Consulate and the headquarters of the HSBC
bank. They killed 27, including the British Consul, Roger Short.

2001, Turkey threatened to annex northern Cyprus.

23/6/1996, Andreas Papandreou, Greek
statesman, born 1919, died.

2/7/1993, In
Turkey, 40 died in an arson attack on a hotel by Islamist terrorists protesting
against Salman
Rushdie’s book The Satanic
Verses.

1991, Turkey relaxed some laws thar repressed Kurdish culture.
Speaking Kurdish was now allowed, but publishing or broadcasting in Kurdish
remained banned; it was also an offence to own a recording of Kurdish music.

15/11/1983, The Turkish part
of Cyprus declared independence. Led by Rauf Dektash, the ‘republic’ was
recognised only by Turkey.

24/4/1983. Turkey restored political
parties.

18/10/1981. The first Socialist government in Greece was
elected under Andreas
Papandreou.

1/1/1981. Greece
became the 10th member of the European Community.

3/8/1977, Archbishop Makarios, religious leader and first President of Cyprus, died.

24/8/1975, The officers responsible for the military coup in Greece were sentenced to death in Athens – this was later
commuted to life imprisonment.

12/6/1975.Greece
applied to join the EEC.

3/1/1975. The Turkish president, Mr Bulent Ecevic, received a
hero’s welcome as he arrived in Famagusta,
northern Cyprus.
He had ordered the Turkish invasion
of part of the island 6 months earlier.

8/12/1974, Greece voted to abolish the monarchy.

7/12/1974, President Makarios returned to Cyprus; however almost half of it was
occupied by Turkey.

17/11/1974. The rule of the colonels ended in Greece, and Karamanlis
became Prime Minister.

19/8/1974, The US Ambassador
to Nicosia, Rodger
Davies, was shot dead during a Greek Cypriot demonstration outside his
Embassy.

27/7/1974.Greek military leaders handed political power
to a civilian government.

23/7/1974, The Greek ‘Colonels’ military junta resigned.Civilian rule returned to Greece, under President
Karamanlis.

22/7/1974.Greece and Turkey
agreed to a ceasefire in Cyprus. On 23/7/1974 Sampson
was replaced as President by Glafkos Clerides. 2,000 British and foreign
residents and tourists were evacuated by the Royal Navy.

20/7/1974. Turkey invaded northern Cyprus, after the overthrow of Makarios.

15/7/1974.In Cyprus.
Archbishop
Makarios was deposed as President in a coup by officers of the Greek
National Guard. Nicos
Sampson was installed as President.Makarios,
nearly assassinated, went into exile for 6 months.Cyprus
descended into near-anarchy, and Turkey
took advantage of this to invade (see 20/7/1974).By August 1974 Turkey
occupied the northern 40% of Cyprus;
Greeks were forced to leave this area.

28/1/1974, President Grivas of Cyprus died aged 75.

5/8/1973, A terrorist attack at Athens Airport left 3 dead and
55 wounded.

1/6/1973.The Greek monarchy was abolished and George
Papadopoulos became first president of the Republic.The Greek Colonels (see 21/4/1967 and
13/12/1967) alleged that ex-King Constantine II was plotting to overthrow their
regime from exile.

8/2/1973.Makarios was re-elected President of Cyprus.

1/11/1968, Georgios
Papandreou, Prime Minister of Greece, died.

13/12/1967, King
Constantine II
fled Greece
after an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the military junta, see 21/4/1967,
and 1/6/1973.

21/4/1967.Colonels in Greeceunder
Papadopolous took power in a military coup;
parliamentary democracy was suspended. King Constantine II initially collaborated
with the colonels until 13/12/1967but
then unsuccessfully attempted a counter coup.He later fled to Rome.

17/8/1964, Greece withdrew its
forces from NATO because of tension with Turkey
over Cyprus.

16/8/1960.Cyprus became independent, withArchbishop Makariosas President.Fazil Kuchuk,
leader of the Turkish Cypriots, was
Vice-President, but relations between the two communities were strained.
The island’s Greek population, some 80% of the total, wanted union, or enosis, with Greece. See 15/7/1974 and
3/4/1955. Britain retained military bases on the island.

27/5/1960, President Adnan
Menderes (1889-1961)
of Turkey was ousted in an army coup.He
founded the Democratic Party in 1945 and became Prime Minister in 1950.
Pro-Western, he took Turkey into NATO in 1952. However severe inflation from
1954 has eroded his support in the towns; Menderes relied on rural peasant support.Menderes was forced to assume dictatorial
powers in April 1960, just before his overthrow. See 17/9/1961. In September
1990 Menderes
was posthumously ‘rehabilitated’ and given a State Funeral, attended by the
Turkish President.

14/12/1959, Makarios III (1913-1977), Archbishop
of Cyprus, was elected first President of Cyprus; he assumed
office on 16/8/1960. His Turkish rival Fazil Kucuk became Vice-President.

1/3/1959.Archbishop Makarios returned to Cyprus, after almost three years exile.

19/2/1959.Greece and Turkey agreed on plans for the independence of Cyprus.

15/2/1959,Archbishop Makarios arrived in London
for talks on Cyprus
with Macmillan.

9/8/1957, The State of
Emergency in Cyprus ended.

17/4/1957, Archbishop Makarios arrived back in Athens,
from a 13-month exile in the Seychelles.

9/3/1956.Archbishop Makarios, implicated in terrorism, was deported by the British from Cyprus to the Seychelles. Riots broke out in Cyprus.

28/11/1955.A state
of emergency was declared in Cyprus
because of EOKA terrorism. The Greek
majority wanted to celebrate Oxi Day, the day Greece entered WW2, but were banned
by the British Governor of Cyprus, Sir John Harding. EOKA really wanted enosis, or union with Greece, fiercely opposed by the Turkish minority
in Cyprus.

5/10/1955, Karamanlis became Prime Minister of Greece,
succeeding Alexander
Papagos on his death.

13/9/1955, The crisis in the
British colony of Cyprus worsened when EOKA called a General Strike. Illegal
marches and demonstrations by both Greeks and Turks led to clashes.

6/9/1955, Anti-Greek riots
in Istanbul and Izmir.

1/4/1955, Greek EOKA terrorists led by Grivas set off a series of bombs in Cyprus, starting a 4-year campaign
against British occupation.Ankara sought to defend the minority
Turkish population in Cyprus.On 9/3/1956 Archbishop Makarios, spiritual
leader of the Greek community, was deported by Britain
to the Seychelles, but
allowed to return to Athens
in 1957.See 16/8/1960.

18/12/1954, Greeks rioted in Cyprus, demanding union with Greece
instead of British rule. Two
rioters were shot by British police as they tore down the Union Jack outside
the police station in Limassol, replacing it with the Greek flag. 42 Greek
Cypriots were arrested. Athens demanded that Cypriots be allowed to vote on
the matter, knowing that Greek Cypriots outnumbered Turks.

1/4/1947.King George IIof Greece died aged 56, and was succeeded by his brother,
45, as King
Paul I.

28/9/1946, King George II returned to Greece. A referendum had shown a majority in favour of
restoring the monarchy.

1/9/1946. A Greek plebiscite favoured return the of the
monarchy.

27/6/1946, Italy ceded the Dodecanese islands to Greece.

23/2/1945, Turkey, reluctantly, declared war on Germany
– only because the Allies had announced that only those nations who did so
would be invited to take part in the United Nations Conference at San Francisco.

12/2/1945,
The Treaty of Varkiza was signed. The Greek resistance agreed to disarm and
relinquish control of all the territory it occupied in exchange for legal
recognition, free elections, and the removal of Nazi collaborators from the
armed forces and police.

17/10/1944,
Rival partisans in Athens began to fight each other.

13/10/1944, Athens
was liberated from the Germans, who occupied it on 27/4/1941.

4/10/1944, Allied troops landed on the Greek mainland, at Patras.

2/10/1944. British troops landed on Crete.

2/8/1944.Turkey broke
off relations with Germany,
reluctantly, under pressure from the United Nations to fulfil its treaty
obligations.

3/1944, The EAM (National Liberation Front) of Greece, a
Leftist coalition dominated by the KKE (Communist
Party of Greece), set up the PEEA (Political
Committee of National Liberation). This was effectively a rival to the
Greek Government-in-exile; the PEEA ran, in areas liberated from the Nazis,
systems of healthcare, education and ustice. It was vehemently opposed to the
return of King
George II. In 1945 the EAM disintegrated and the KKE took over.
After the War, the Communists, Republicans and Royalists started a civil war
that lasted until 1949.

20/5/1941.Germany began an aerial invasion of Crete. King George II of Greece
fled Crete on 23/5/1941. By 1/6/1941 the
German occupation of Crete was complete.Guerrilla
action continued on Crete until its liberation in 1945.

14/5/1941.Germany
began a week-long bombing of Crete. On 20/5/1941 German paratroopers
attacked the islands three airfields. They
managed to seize only one airfield, Maleme, but this was enough, and the British had to evacuate Crete, leaving
13,000 wounded behind.

27/4/1941. The Germans
occupied Athens. They held it until 12/10/1944.

22/4/1941.British
forces left Greece.

9/4/1941,Salonika was taken
by the Germans.This cut off Thrace from Greece
and divided Macedonia
in two.

28/3/1941, The Battle of Matapan, off the coast of
Crete. The British navy beat an Italian fleet, sinking seven warships for no
loss of its own.

22/11/1940. The Greeks routed the Italians at Koritza.

29/10/1940, British troops landed in Greece.

28/10/1940.Italy invaded Greece, from Albania.This opened a Balkan Front, and was a
complication to Hitler’s plans to invade Russia, as the British would become
involved.

2/6/1940, Constantine I, King of the Hellenes, was born
the son of King
Paul.

24/6/1939, Turkey concluded a pact of mutual assistance with France,
see 12/5/1939.Turkey enedeavoured to remain neutral in the unfolding conflict.Its army was poorly equipped.

23/6/1939.Hatay,
formerly the Syrian town of Alexandretta, was
incorporated into Turkey.
It had been part of Ottoman territory until 1919, and had been the subject of a
Franco-Turkish dispute which was settled at the League of
Nations in 1937. This said that Alexandretta was to be its own
entity controlling its own internal affairs, with Syria controlling its foreign
policy. Iskenderun is the Turkish name; a city
near this site was established by Alexander the Great in 333 BC to commemorate
his victory over the Persians at Issus.

18/11/1938, Twenty
people were trampled to death at the funeral of Kemal Attaturk.

11/11/1938.Ismet Inonu succeeded Kemal Ataturk, who died the day
before, as President of Turkey.

10/11/1938.Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic in 1923, died aged 57. Ismet Inonu, 54, was elected to succeed him.

31/7/1938. Bulgaria signed a non-aggression pact with Greece.

3/7/1938, By agreement with France,
the district of Alexandretta was established as an autonomous part of Syria, but with a legal system conforming mainly
to Turkey.It was called Hatay, after the Hittites,
which Turkey
considered its ancestors.Within ayear, Hatay was ceded to Turkey.

27/4/1938. A friendship treaty was signed between Greece and Turkey.

5/8/1936, The Greek Communist Party attempted to call a General
Strike.However this precipitated a Right Wing dictatorship which broke up
the Communist Party.

18/3/1936, Eleutherios Venizelos, Greek
politician, died.

25/11/1935, The
monarchy was restored in Greece.

1/1/1935.Mustafa
Kemal changed
his name to Kemal
Ataturk.

25/11/1934.Mustapha
Kemal told all
Turks to adopt a surname by 1/1/1935. His was to be ‘Ataturk’, or ‘Father of the
Turks’. He also banned
hereditary titles in Turkey.

20/4/1931.The
Republican party of Mustapha Kemal won a landslide in the Turkish
national elections.

28/3/1930.Constantinople
had its name changed to Istanbul, and Angora to Ankara, by Kemal Attaturk.

3/11/1928.Turkey abolished the use of the Arabic script and
adopted the Roman alphabet.

9/4/1928.Turkey abolished Islam as the State religion.

31/10/1927, Kemal Ataturkabolished
the Fez in favour of western headgear.

30/10/1927, Admiral
Paul Kondouriotis, the President of Greece, survived an assassination
attempt by a 25-year-old waiter. Zafioios
Goussies shot President
Kondouriotis in the head as the he was leaving a conference of Greece's
mayors in Athens.

2/9/1927, Mustafa Kemalmade Turkey a one-party state.

5/6/1926, At the Treaty
of Angora, Turkey accepted the
Brussels Line, setting the northern boundary of Iraq,
and including Mosul within Iraq.Turkey
was to receive a share of oil revenues from Mosul
for the next 25 years, and to be compensated for public works carried out
around Mosul.

16/12/1925, The League of Nations voted to uphold the Brussels Line, dividing Mosul villayet, see
21/11/1925, 29/10/1924.

25/11/1925, In Turkey, Kemal Ataturk, as part of his
Westernisation program, outlawed the traditional fez and substituted western
hats.

21/11/1925, The Permanent Court of International Justice agreed to the Brussels Line, dividing Mosul villayet, see
29/10/1924, and 16/12/1925.

29/10/1925, Greek troops withdrew from Bulgaria, on orders from the League
of Nations.

22/10/1925. Border dispute flared between Greece and Bulgaria.

1/5/1925. Cyprus became a British
Crown Colony. It had been annexed by Britain
from Turkey in 1914 when Turkey supported Germany in World War One.

16/4/1925. In Turkey,
the Kurdish uprising ended.

2/4/1925, France and Turkey agreed on the autonomy of
Alexandretta.

28/2/1925.Kurdish
uprising in Turkey.

29/10/1924, The Council
of Brussels drew the Brussels Line, dividing
the villayet of Mosul into Turkish and Iraqi areas.See 21/11/1925, 16,12,1925.

1924, Venizelos became Prime Minister
of Greece.

1/5/1924, Greece proclaimed itself a republic.

2/3/1924, The
Turkish National Assembly abolished the caliphate, disestablishing the Islamic religion.

27/1/1924.Rauf Denktash,
Turkish-Cypriot politician, was born,

17/12/1923. The Greek Army deposed King George II.

29/10/1923.Mustapha
Kemal proclaimed Turkey
a Republic and himself as its first President, called Kemal Ataturk.

12/10/1923.The Turkish capital was officially moved from Istanbul to Ankara.

31/8/1923.Italy seized the Greek island of Corfu.This followed an incident in which an Italian
General and 4 members of his staff were shot
whilst determining the Albanian-Greek border on 27/8/1923.Mussolini saw the incident as a national
insult.Greece
appealed to the League of Nations on 3/9/1923, and under pressure from France and the UK,
Italy withdrew from Corfu on 27/9/1923.Greece was compelled to pay a
considerable indemnity to Italy.

13/8/1923.Mustapha Kemal, (Ataturk), was elected President of Turkey.

24/7/1923. The Treaty
of Lausanne was signed. This restored Adrianople to Turkey after
the Greco-Turkish was of 1923. Turkey
regained the territories lost after World War One, including the eastern Aegean
and Armenia.

11/1/1923, Constantine, King of the Hellenes, died of a
brain haemorrhage in Palermo (born 2/8/1868).

1/11/1922.Mustafa
Kemal announced
a new TurkishRepublic.

27/9/1922. Following Greece’s defeat in Turkey, King Constantine abdicated (see more
at 18/3/1913). He was succeeded by King George II.

11/9/1922. The British Mandate in Palestine began; Britain took
over rulership from the Ottoman Turks.

9/9/1922, The Turkish Army entered Smyrna, and its
Christians fled in chaos.Central Smyrna was burnt on 13/9/1922.

26/8/1922. Turkey began an offensive
against Greece
to recover land lost after World War One. The Russian government was sending
military aid to Turkey.
On 9/9/1922 Greece
lost Smyrna,
ending its presence on the eastern Aegean coast. Turkish forces now
threatened British forces occupying the southern Dardanelles at Chanak; the
British government authorised an ultimatum to Turkey, but the local British
commander delayed its delivery until local Turkish agreement to respect the
British zone had been secured.As the
Greek Army retreated it burnt Turkish towns.

29/7/1922. The Allies forbade Greece
to occupy Constantinople.

1921, The chief organiser of the
Ottoman massacre of Armenian Christians, Talaat Pasha, was himself assassinated by a survivor
of that genocide. Pasha had rfecorded that the population of
Armenians under Ottoman rule had fallen from 1,265,000 in 1915 to just 284,157
in 1917.

13/10/1921, Turkey, Russia,
and the CaucasianRepublics signed a treaty in Kars.Turkey retained Kars,
Ardahan, and Artvin, and Russia
took Batum.

3/1/1921,Turkey
concluded a peace with the Republic of Armenia at Alexandropol.Armenia
had been raiding Turkish frontier villages, which had led Turkey to attack Armenia.Turkey
took Kars and
Alendropol.

18/12/1920King Constantine was restored to the Greek
throne.

5/12/1920, A Greek referendum result called for the return of
King
Constantine, deposed by the Allies in 1917.

2/12/1920, Armenia
was forced to conclude a peace treaty with Turkey
that not only annulled the Wilson Line but gave the district of Kars, formerly Russian/Armenian,
to Turkey.This treaty also stated that
‘there were no Armenian majorities anywhere in Turkey’.

22/11/1920, US President Wilson
set a proposed border (The Wilson Line) between Turkey and Armenia that would
have given Armenia lands as far west as Trebizond, Erzingan, and Bitlis.However on the ground both Turkey and the USSR
were advancing into Armenia
and the Wilson
line never materialised.See 2/12/1920.

25/10/1920, King Alexander
of Greece died of blood poisoning after being bitten by a monkey.
His father, who abdicated in 1917, resumed the throne, continuing the struggle
against Turkey.

10/8/1920.The Ottoman Empire signed the Treaty of Sevres, ceding 80% of
its land area. Syria became a French mandate
(including Lebanon, see1/9/1920), Palestine and Mesopotamia became British
mandates, Rhodes and the Dodecanese islands went to Italy, and the other Aegean
Islands went to Greece.

23/4/1920.Turkish
Nationalists set up a provisional government at Ankara, with Mustapha Kemal as President.

20/3/1920. In response to the Syrian claim of 8/3/1920, the
Lebanese Christians proclaimed their independence, choosing as their flag the
French tricolour with a Lebanese cedar at its centre.

16/3/1920.Allied
troops occupied Istanbul.

8/3/1920.Syria proclaimed
independence from Ottoman Turkey, with Emir Faisal, hero of the Arab
revolt, as King. He claimed not just the smaller Syria
agreed by Britain and France, but of ‘natural Syria’, extending to the Euphrates and including
Lebanon and Palestine. See 20/3/1920.

12/2/1920, A conference began in London
to settle the main frontiers of Turkey
to be demarcated in the Treaty of Sevres.This conference ended on 23/2/1920, see
19/4/1920.

5/8/1919, Kemal declared Turkey independent of the
Sultan at the Turkish Nationalist Congress.

30/10/1918. (1) An armistice
was concluded aboard the British warship Agamemnon,
at Mudros, between Britain and Turkey.However Turkey
was to face some four more year’s fighting with Greece, and effectively with the
Western Allies.

(2) Lieutenant Colonel Thomas
Lawrence, ‘Lawrence of Arabia’, shocked King George V by turning down the Order
of the Bath and Distinguished Service Order. Lawrence was disappointed at how
the Arabs had not achieved independence after World War One but their land had
been carved up between Britain and France.France, Catholic, took the Christian sites of Lebanon and Syria; Britain
took Jordan and Iraq.

26/10/1918. Aleppo,
Syria, was captured from the Turks by British and Arab troops advancing
from the south.

13/10/1918, British troops occupied Tripoli, Lebanon.

7/10/1918, British troops took Beirut and Sidon.

1/10/1918. Arab forces under Emir Faisal, including the
British officer T
E Lawrence, captured Damascus from
the Turks.

22/9/1918. Turkish resistance in Palestine collapsed.

20/9/1918. The British captured Nazareth.

18/9/1918, The British under General Allenby started a major
offensive against the Turks, pushing them north out of Palestine.

9/9/1918. Allied victory at Megiddo.

29/7/1918. Germany severed diplomatic relations with Ottoman
Turkey.

13/6/1918. A Turkish offensive in Palestine was halted.

26/4/1918, The Turks captured Kars, Caucasus, from Russia, however their cause was doomed as General Allenby
made major gains in Palestine.

14/4/1918, Following the collapse of the Russians, Turkey captured Batumi
on the Black Sea.See 26/4/1918.

9/12/1917. Jerusalem
was surrendered by the Turks to the
British under General Allenby.

14/11/1917.Jaffa (Joppa) was captured by the British,
under General Allenby, from the Turks.

9/11/1917.Arthur Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary,
unveiled plans for a Jewish national
homeland in Palestine.
The message was conveyed to the Zionist representative, Baron Rothschild. The
British Wear cabinet, under David Lloyd George, believed that Zionist support would help the war effort,
especially against the Ottoman Turks. Arabs outnumber Jews by ten to one in
Palestine but
Zionist leaders like Dr Chaim Weizmann would try and build up their numbers.

31/10/1917.British forces under General Allenby captured Beersheba
from the Turks. This opened the way
for the British capture of Jerusalem and the
rest of Palestine.

Meanwhile in 1916 Britain and France had secretly signed the Sykes-Picot agreement to divided up the
Ottoman Lands in the Middle East after the War. France was to get the
north-western half of the Fertile Crescent, that is Syria and Lebanon; Britain
was to get the south-east, Jordan and Iraq. The Catholic church wanted French
control of the Mediterranean coast, where many Maronite Christians lived, and
Britain wanted French lands between them and the Russians to the north. Britain
retained an air corridor to Iraq through Jordan; Britain was dropping poison
gas on rebellious Iraqi Arabs. France divided off Lebanon as a Christian
Republic from Syria; it also divided off Hatay and gave that to Syria, due to
lobbying from Hatay’s Turkish minority. The Allies also considered giving
Palestine to Belgium. They also, at the Treaty of Sevres (10/8/1920) backed the
formation of a Kurdish State, but refused to allow the Kurds in Iraq or Syria
to be part of this State; the idea never materialised.

4/7/1917, Lawrence of Arabia reassured the Arabs, who
were wary of attacking the Turkish fort of Kethira under a full moon, that “for
a while there will be no moon”. Lawrence knew a lunar eclipse was due. Turkish
defenders panicked as the moon vanished, and the fort fell to the Arabs.

29/6/1917.Greece
declared war on Germany.

12/6/1917. The pro-GermanKing
Constantine of Greece,
who dismissed the pro-Allied government of Venizelos, was himself forced to abdicate by
the Allies.

26/3/1917. British attack the Turks at Gaza
(First Battle of Gaza).

17/3/1917. The British heavily defeated the Turks near Gaza.

11/3/1917. The Allies captured Baghdad
from Ottoman Turkey.

16/10/1916.The Allies took Athens.

27/9/1916. Greece declared war on Bulgaria, which itself had declared
war on Rumania
earlier in the month.

20/8/1916. The Allies began an offensive against Turkey in Mesopotamia.

5/8/1916. The British defeated the Turks in a naval battle
off Port Said.

9/6/1916.Sherif Hussein of Mecca led a revolt against the Ottoman Turks. The
Arabs were angered by the Young Turks nationalist and secular policies.

29/4/1916. British troops surrendered to the Ottoman Turks
after a siege of 143 days at Kut-el-Amara
in Iraq.
See 22/11/1915.

14/4/1916.The Allied bombarded Istanbul.

2/3/1916, The Russians took Bitlis, in Turkestan,
from the Ottoman Turks.

16/2/1916, The Russians
captured Erzerum, in the Caucasus,
from Turkey.

17/1/1916.Russia began an offensive against Turkey.

8/1/1916.Gallipoli was evacuated by Allied troops.
This was the end of an unsuccessful attempt to capture Constantinople.
See 20/12/1915.

20/12/1915. Australian, New Zealand, and British troops
were evacuated from the ill-fated Gallipoli
expedition. See 25/4/1915. The aim had been to capture the Dardanelles and Constantinople, and so knock Turkey out of
the war, and link up with the Russian Black Sea Fleet. However disease, flies,
fever, and mosquitoes, and the incompetence of the Allied commanders, were
compounded by the fact that landings were not made until two months after
Turkish positions here had been bombarded. Hence the element of surprise was
lost, and the Turks had ample time to prepare strong defences. Evacuation was
completed by 8/1/1916, without casualties. An ingenious plan involved loading
provisions onto the Gallipoli beaches in daylight, but at night men, guns and
horses were evacuated, leaving rifles set to fire automatically at intervals.
At the last moment an Allied destroyer trained a searchlight on the Turkish
lines, the Turks fired back, and under this exchange of fire the Allies slipped
away undetected.

22/11/1915. General Charles Vere Ferrers Townshend was advancing
by boat on Baghdad with a force of
9,000 men of the 6th Indian Division. The land was roadless, an
‘arid billiard table’ as he described it. At Ctesiphon, 20 miles short of Baghdad, Townshend came up against a
large, well supplied force. He was short of supplies because a stingy and
over-optimistic government in India expected him to get all the supplies he
needed in Baghdad.Townshend’s forces
drove out the Turks but at a loss of
40% of his men. He was now unable to withstand any Turkish counter-attack, let
alone advance further, so he retreated to Kut
with 1,600 Turkish prisoners of war and 4,500 wounded from both sides.The Invasion of Mesopotamia was to secure the
oil but that only required the occupation of a small area around Basra. This
would, keep the Turks away from the
Iranian port of Abadan, terminus of the Anglo-Iranian pipeline which supplied
the Royal navy with oil. Kutwas
besieged by the Turks, from 8/12/1915. Townshend had 13,500 inside to
feed, including some 2,500 Indian non-combatants and 2,000 sick and wounded.
There were also 6,000 Arabs. They had to contend with freezing cold and
torrential rain. A relief force never got near enough; three relief attempts
were made, at a cost of 23,000 casualties. The Indians would not eat meat,
although the oxen were slaughtered for food by the British, then the camels,
horses, and finally cats, starlings, dogs, and hedgehogs. Gallipoli had
been evacuated by the British on 8/1/1916 and elated by this, and now with
troops to spare from there, the Turks
refused a ransom of £2million (£67million in 2002 prices) to let the defenders
leave. Kut was the first siege in which supplies were dropped by air,
including flour for the Indian’s chappatis. However the Turks and their German
allies had more and better aircraft. Finally Kut surrendered on 27/4/1916, with rations down to seven ounces of
grain a day for the 12,000 men there. More Indian and British soldiers died
during the forced march from Kut to captivity in Mesopotamia or even all the
way to Turkey. However Townshend was in relatively comfortable captivity near Constantinople.Kutfinally fell to the Allies in
February 1917, and Baghdad fell in March 1917.

5/10/1915.Allied troops landed at Salonika,
Greece, to help Serbia (see
26/4/1915). These troops probably dissuaded Greece
from joining the German side, and in 1918 took part in an offensive against Bulgaria, but
otherwise played little role in the war.

28/9/1915. The British defeated the Turks at Kut El Amara in Mesopotamia.

23/9/1915.King Constantine of Greece
began mobilising against Bulgaria,
in aid of Serbia.

15/9/1915, The Entente (France, UK)
promised Bulgaria part of Macedonia
if she declared war on Turkey.

21/8/1915. Italy declared war on the Ottoman
Empire.

15/8/1915, The Allied landings at Suvla, Dardanelles, were completed.

6/8/1915. New Allied landings on Gallipoli. See
8/1/1916.

27/5/1915. The Turkish
government decided to deport the entire Armenian population to Syria and Mesopotamia,
suspecting them of lack of loyalty. The deportation involved much cruelty
against the Armenians. Of the total Armenian population of 1.8 million, a third
were deported, a third escaped deportation, and a third were killed. The
Russians conquered Turkish Armenia in 1916 and proclaimed ‘the liberation of
the Armenian people from the Turkish yoke’ but prevented the Armenians from
returning to their homeland as they planned to settle the area with Cossacks.

26/4/1915. Allied forces
established themselves on the Gallipoli Peninsula, having landed the previous
day, 25/4/1915. This was an attempt to
take control from the Dardanelles from Turkey,
and open up a supply route to Russia.
The Allies hoped, against all evidence, that the landing itself would provoke a
coup in Turkey and remove it from the War. Russian Jews, who saw the ottoman
Empire as a barrier to a Jewish Homeland, supported the exercise. Forces landed
included 27,500 British, 18,100 ANZACs, and 16,800 French. However the landing
site was fully exposed to Turkish fire, and evacuation of Allied troops
was the only option. Also on 25/9/1915 the Germans attacked Serbia and Allied forces had to go to Salonika to buttress Serbian resistance (see 5/10/1915).
Evacuation began on 8 December 1915 and was completed by 9 January 1916. The Dardanelles
expedition cost 70,700 British casualties (26,000 dead), 25,700 Australians (7,800
killed), 23,000 French (8,000 killed), 7,100 New Zealanders (2,445 killed) and
5,500 Indians (1,682 killed). However the evacuation was managed
with very little loss of life.

24/4/1915. The arrest in
Constantinople (now Istanbul) of 235 Armenian
academics, politicians, lawyers and journalists. Another 600 were later
detained. All were sent to Anatolia, most of them slaughtered. Turkey feared
they would collaborate with Russia. On this day
the Ottoman Interior Minister, Talaat Pasha, gave the order for the Armenian Massacre. Many Armenians were
deported to the Syrian desert to die.

19/2/1915
The Dardanelles
campaign began. A Franco-British fleet began shelling Turkish fortifications
along the Dardanelles, to open up the strategic waterway to get munitions to
Russia via the Black Sea, and deliver Russian grain to France and the UK.
Spotter planes from the aircraft carrier HMS
Ark Royal were directing the gunners by radio.

5/11/1914. Following Russia,
Britain and France
declared war on the Ottoman Empire. Britain
annexed Cyprus. However the Dardanelles were now closed to Allied shipping,
and it was vital to be able to get supplies to support Russia. The ports of
Archangel and Vladivostock were ice-bound, so an attempt was made to seize the Dardanelles by the Gallipoli
campaign (see 25/4/1915).

4/11/1914.The Russians
declared war on Turkey and invaded Armenia,
part of the Ottoman Empire.

29/10/1914, Turkish
warships bombarded the Russian ports of Sevastopol, Odessa and Novorossiysk. This provoked a declaration
of war by Russia against Turkey on 4/11/1919; also by Britain and France on 5/11/1914. In Turkey
the Young Turks, in 1908, had had two aims; to
pull together the disintegrating remains of the Ottoman Empire, and to recover land lost to Russia. However they found the Turkish Treasury in debt to
European banks by the then-colossal sum of £200 million. They sought an
alliance with a wealthy European nation that could help rebuild the Turkish
economy. Britain, which had helped found Turkey’s National Bank in 1908, was
approached, as an enemy of Germany with whom the former Turkish Sultan Abdul Hamid had
been friendly. Britain declined the approach, believing that an alliance with
Turkey would unite Europe against it. Turkey again approached Britain during
the Balkan War (1912-13) and was again rebuffed. In July 1914 France also
rejected overtures by Turkey. Moreover on 1/8/1914 Winston Churchill ordered the
requisition of two warships being built in Britain for the Turkish Navy.
Meanwhile the German General Otto Liman von Sanders was assisting
the modernisation of the Turkish Army. Germany hoped that Turkey, possibly
allied with Bulgaria, would threaten Russia without direct German involvement.
The Young Turk,
Ismail EnverPasha,
Minister for War, approached the German Ambassador in Constantinopleon 22/7/1914 to propose a formal alliance.
The German Ambassador, Freiherr von Wangenheim, declined; Germany
assessed that an alliance with Turkey would exacerbate tensions with Russia,
and therefore be of advantage to Britain and France, but be of no gain to
Germany because of the weak state of the Turkish Army, and the parlous state of
the Turkish economy that retarded the development of the Turkish military. However
Kaiser
Wilhelm II, Emperor of Germany, on learning of Enver’s approach, overruled Wangenheim
and instructed Chancellor
Theobald von Bethmann to open negotiations with Turkey. A secret treaty of alliance between
Germany and Turkey was signed on 2/8/1914, essentially a mutual guarantee
of defence against, only, any attack by Russia. The secrecy allowed Enver
to hedge his bets and only intervene against Russia when it suited him.
Therefore although Germany had mobilised against Russia on 1/8/1914 Enver
did not attack immediately. German Admiral Wilhelm von Souchon sailed two
German ships, the SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau, past British ships in the
Mediterranean just hours before Britain declared war on Germany, on 4/8/1914.
Britain chased these ships but did not prevent their arrival at Constantinople,
where they became part of the Turkish navy, replacing the ships confiscated by
Britain. They were renamed the Yavuz
Sultan Selim and the Midilli, and
Turkey also received 20 million marks in gold by train from Germany, to assist
in updating Turkish military capabilities. Once the gold was received, and
Turkey had witnessed German successes against the Russians in East Prussia
(following initial defeats inflicted on Germany at Tannenbirg and the Marne)
the Yavuz Sultan Selim and the Midilli, complete with German crews,
bombarded the Russian ports. Churchill was not too perturbed by Turkey’s
entry into the Great War on the German side. Almost all the Turkish Army’s 43
divisions were only on peacetime strengths of 4,000 men, not the wartime basis
of 10,000. The Turkish divisions based in Mesopotamia (now Iraq), also Arabia
and the Levant, were manned by local recruits of dubious loyalty to the Ottoman
Empire. The British enjoyed easy victories against these divisions in the Basra
area, where the local oilfields were secured. However later in the war the Young Turks
reinforced the fighting capabilities of the army, giving Britain a harder
battle.

1/10/1914. Turkey closed the Dardanelles.

2/9/1914. The Ottoman Empire mobilised its forces, in World
War One.

14/3/1914, Peace was concluded between Turkey and Serbia.

13/11/1913, Peace was
concluded between Turkey and Greece.Greece acquired Crete
and the AegeanIslands,
excepting Tenedos and Imbros; also the DodecaneseIslands
remained under Italian occupation.

17/10/1913. Serbia invaded Albania.

29/9/1913, The Treaty
of Constantinople, an addition to the Treaty
of Bucharest (see 10/8/1913), settled the frontier between Bulgaria and Turkey.

13/8/1913, Archbishop Makarios, President of Cyprus 1960-77, was born near Paphos, the son of a
farmer.

10/8/1913.The Third Treaty of Bucharest ended the Second Balkan
War.Rumania gained the fertile area of
Southern Dobruja, which had been Bulgarian since 1878, whilst Serbia and Greece divided Macedonia between them; againterritory that Bulgaria wanted.Greece received Salonika, a major port.Bulgaria
merely received the mountainous areas of Pirin and Dospat, and two small
Mediterranean ports called Dedeagach and Lagos; Bulgaria was left
resentful.Turkey’s possession in Europe were limited to the area around
Constantinople and Adrianople.Albania was created.See 6/9/1915.In the First World War, the losers by this Treaty (Turkey and Bulgaria)
fought on the German side; the gainers (Greece,
Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro) fought on the Allied
side.

18/7/1913, Turkish forces recovered Adrianople from the Bulgarians,
who took the city in March 1917.

12/7/1913, Turkey seized Adrianople.

11/7/1913, Romania invaded Bulgaria.

10/7/1913. Russia declared war on Bulgaria.500,000 Romanian troops crossed the frontier
into Bulgaria, occupied
southern Dobruja, and advanced on Sofia.

3/7/1913. Romania mobilised its troops. in response to Bulgaria’s
attack on its neighbours.

1/7/1913. Greece and Serbia
declared war on Bulgaria.

29/6/1913. Bulgaria launched a surprise attack on Serbia and Greece, thereby starting the Second
Balkan War.Bulgaria
was then invaded by Romania
and Turkey.See 10/8/1913.

24/6/1913.Greece and Serbia broke their alliance with Bulgaria over a
border dispute. On 29/6/1913 Greece
and Serbia were attacked by Bulgaria.

30/5/1913. Turkey signed a peace treaty with the Balkan League
(the Treaty of London), ending their
war.Under this Treaty Salonika was formally assigned to Greece.

22/4/1913. Montenegro captured Scutari after a 6 month siege.

16/4/1913, Turkey signed an armistice with Bulgaria.

26/3/1913. The Balkan allies took Adrianople from Turkey
after a 155 day siege.

18/3/1913, George I, King of Greece from 1863, was assassinated in Salonika by a Greek
called Schinasi.Constantine I became King of Greece, in the
newly-occupied city of Salonika.Constantine opposed the pro-Allied policy of Venizelos,
and in June 1917 the Allies forced his abdication in favour of his second son, Alexander,
who ruled until dying from a monkey bite in October 1920.A plebiscite two months later voted
overwhelmingly for the return of Constantine I.However Constantine
was unfairly blamed for Greek military failure in action against Turkey in Anatolia and Smyrna, and he abdicated on 27/9/1922.He died in exile in Sicily a year later.

6/3/1913. Hostilities resumed in the Balkans; the Greeks
took Janina, capturing 32,000 Turks.

7/2/1913, 5,000 Turks died in a battle with Bulgaria.

3/2/1913.Bulgaria re-stared the Balkan War. On
7/2/1913 a Turkish-Bulgarian battle left 5,000 Turks dead, and on 26/3/1913 the
Bulgarians captured Adrianople from Turkey.

23/1/1913, Enver Pasha, leader of the Young Turks,
entered the principal council chamber of the Sublime Porte with Talat
and Kemal
and shouted “Death to Kamil Pasha”. They forced the Grand Vizier to
resign at gunpoint and shot dead the Minister of War, General Nazim. Enver
then forced the Sultan to appoint his ally, Shevket, as Grand Vizier. The
British ensured safe passage for Kamil out of Turkey but he was never
reinstated as Grand Vizier. Enver, Talat and Kemal went on to establish a military junta to
govern Turkey.

22/1/1913, Turkey accepted a ceasefire ultimatum.

17/1/1913, Serbian
troops massacred Muslims.

9/1/1913. Turkey breached the armistice by attacking Bulgaria.

6/1/1913, A peace conference in London broke down when Turkey
refused to cede Adrianople, the Aegean Islands and Crete.

2/1/1913.Turkey agreed to give up almost all its European
territories.

4/12/1912. Turkey concluded an armistice with Bulgaria and Serbia;
Greece
also ceased fighting.

30/11/1912, Bulgaria and Turkey signed an armistice.

28/11/1912. Albanian independence was proclaimed and
confirmed in London
on 20/12/1912 in principle and the new state’s borders were confirmed on
29/7/1913. However these borders
included less than half of the ethnic Albanians.

18/11/1912. The Serbs occupied Monastir.

8/11/1912.The Greeks
occupied Salonika.This was during
the First Balkan War, and ended 482
years of Turkish occupation.

3/11/1912. Turkey appealed for mediation in the war with
Italy, by the great European powers.

1/11/1912. The Greeks occupied Samothrace.

23/10/1912. The Greeks routed the Turks at Sarandaporos.

19/10/1912.Allied
Balkan armies invaded Turkey.

18/10/1912. The Ottoman Turks agreed to cede Tripoli
and Cyrenaiaca (now Libya)
to Italy,
at the Peace of Lausanne.Greece declared war on Turkey.

14/10/1912.The Turks invaded Serbia.Greece,
Serbia, and Bulgaria issued ultimatums to Turkey
demanding the demobilisation of the Turkish Army in the Balkans.

8/10/1912.Montenegro declared war on the Ottoman Empire.

1/10/1912, Greece,
Bulgaria, and Serbia prepared to fight Turkey.

30/9/1912, Russia mobilised its forces in response to unrest
in the Balkans.

3/8/1912. The Ottoman Turks granted Albania limited autonomy.

2/7/1912, Serbia allied with Greece and Bulgaria against Ottoman Turkey,
see 29/5/1912.

29/5/1912. Greece signed an anti-Ottoman alliance with Bulgaria. Serbia joined
this alliance on 2/7/1912.

4/5/1912. The Italians occupied the island of Rhodes,
formerly held by the Ottoman Turks.

5/11/1911.Italy
announced that it had taken from Turkey the territories of Libya, Tripolitania,
and Cyrenaiaca.

20/10/1911. Italy defeated the Turks at Tripoli, Libya.

30/9/1911. Italian troops attacked the Turks in Tripoli harbour.

29/9/1911. Italy
declared war on Turkey, having been
assured of the neutrality of other European countries.The Italian Navy bombarded Preveza, and
Italian forces landed at Tripoli
and in Cyrenicia. This was in retaliation for the alleged mistreatment of
Italians in Libya. The Italians expected the Arabs to welcome them as
liberators from Turkish rule, but instead the Arabs sided with the Turks in
resisting Italian rule. In May 1912 Italy invaded some islands off Turkey,
including Rhodes, to put further pressure on Turkey. Then Italy had some
unexpected good fortune when in 1912 Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece
started the Balkan War against Turkey, forcing the Ottomans to surrender Libya
to Italy. However Arab resistance continued and despite a permanent Italian
garrison of 50,000 troops Italian rule only covered Tripoli and other major
towns. At least, though, Italy could now claim to have its own African colony.

1/12/1908, Italy demanded that Austria pay compensation for
the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina,
see 7/10/1908.

7/10/1908.Austria annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina, taking advantage of
instability within the Ottoman Empire. Though formally part of the Ottoman
Empire, its Serb-Croat population favoured union with Serbia. Other
European countries were shocked at Austria’s move. Serbia was
especially angry that Serbs in the region had not got autonomy. However Russia
agreed with Austria not to oppose this annexation in return for Austria
supporting the opening of the Dardanelles to Russian warships. Turkey accepted
cash compensation for the loss of Bosnia and Hercegovina on
12/1/1909. See 1/12/1908.

5/10/1908. Prince Ferdinand declared Bulgaria independent of Ottoman Turkey.Austria
annexed Bosnia
and Hercegovina.Russia wanted Turkey weak so as not to
block its plans for expansion.

24/7/1908, Sultan Abdulhamid II, ruler of
the Ottoman Empire, was forced to implement reforms by the Young Turk (Jonturkler) Movement.
This included the reinstatement of the 1876 constitution and the recall of
Parliament, both suspended under the Sultan’s autocratic rule. The Young Turk Movement
began in 1889 when a group of medical students at the Istanbul Academy started
a campaign to overthrow the Sultan. The Movement spread to other colleges, and
the authorities tried to suppress it; they exiled many Young Turks to Paris, where they
continued to plan for a revolution.

3/7/1908, In
Ottoman Turkey, Major
Ahmed Niyazi revolted against the provincial authorities, under the
autocratic rule of Sultan Abdulhamid II. The rebellion quickly
spread to other army divisions, forcing concessions by the Sultan.

8/2/1908.Czar Nicholas II ordered Russian troops to the
Iranian border after Turkey made
incursions into Iran.

10/10/1904. Kurdish tribesmen massacred
Armenians in Turkey.

26/3/1904, Xenophon
Zolotas, Prime Minister of Greece, was born

17/9/1903, Turks massacred 10,000 in Macedonia.

8/9/1903. Turks massacred 50,000 Bulgarians.

2/8/1903, The
revolutionary organisation VMRO (Vnutrasnja Makedonska Revolucionarska
Organizacija, or Internal Revolutionary Macedonian Organisation) staged the
Illinden Uprising against Ottoman rule. They hoped to bring in the major
European powers, but the rebellion was badly organised and its leader, Gotse Delchev,
was captured and executed before it even began. The European powers avoided
involvement in the uprising and it was brutally suppressed by the Ottomans.
However post-event the AustrianEmperor Francis Joseph, and Tsar Nicholas
II of Russia forced the Ottoman Government to pay compensation to
Macedonia and allow in foreign observers.

14/12/1901, Paul I, King of Greece, was born.

9/11/1901, The Sultan of Turkey accepted a French ultimatum
to stop interfering with French interests in Turkey.

1900, On Crete, British
archaeologist Arthur
Evans discovered a previously unknown Bronze Age civilisation. He
called it ‘Minoan’ after a legendary
Cretan king.

10/1/1900, The Young Turks
published their manifesto in Cairo. It called for the modernisation of Turkey
and an end to ‘ineffective’ Ottoman rule.

6/11/1898. Turkey evacuated its forces from Crete.

4/12/1897. Greece and Turkey signed a
peace treaty.

17/4/1897.War broke
out between Greece and the Ottoman Empire.Turkey accused Greece of fomenting revolt in Crete.On 19/5/1897, after several defeats by Turkey
and having been forced to withdraw from Crete, Greece signed an armistice with
Turkey at Thessaly.

10/2/1897.Greece sent ships and troops
to Crete, 4 days after Crete’s proclamation of union with Greece.

29/8/1896.Many
Armenians, perhaps 3,000 or more, were being killed in Turkey three days after
the Armenians seized the Ottoman Bank in Istanbul, to draw the world’s
attention to their fight against Ottoman rule. The Armenian uprising began
in 1894, and they hoped to break free of Turkish rule as Bulgaria had done.
Some 200,000 Armenians were killed in Anatolia. Britain’s support for Armenia threatened the favoured position it had
held for over 40 years in Istanbul. Germany began to manoeuvre to take Britain’s place, eager
to secure concessions for its Berlin to Baghdad Railway project.

6/8/1893.The 3 ½ mile Corinth Canal
opened in Greece. Cut up to 300 feet deep, it took ten years to build.

1889, The Young Turk movement was founded by an Albanian, Ibrahim Temo.

13/7/1878.(-24,405) At the Congress of Berlin, (Treaty of Berlin) Britain,
Russia, Austria, Germany, France, Italy, and the Ottoman Empire reached
agreement on the future of the Balkan states, superseding the Treaty of San
Stefano.Northern Dobruja, formerly
part of Bulgaria under Turkish rule, was given to Romania.At the same time, Romania ceded Bessarabia to
Russia.Bessarabia was more desirable
than Dobruja, and Romania wanted Transylvania, which belonged to Hungary but
had a mainly Romanian population. The independence of Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro were recognised by
Turkey; Bulgaria was also divided into two parts, one of which, Eastern
Rumelia, was to be a self-governing Turkish Province. In 1885 an uprising in Eastern Rumelia
resulted in the union of that province with Bulgaria. Russian navalexpansion was limited, Austro-Hungary was allowed to occupy Bosnia-Hercegovina, the location
of Sarajevo.

12/7/1878, Turkey ceded Cyprus to
British administration.

22/6/1878, At Shumen the Turks capitulated to the
Russians; the town of Shumen was
ceded by Turkey to Bulgaria.It was renamed Kolarovgrad in 1950.

4/6/1878.Britain and Turkey signed a secret agreement
by which Britain was allowed to occupy Cyprus in return for protecting
Turkey against Russian advances in Anatolia.

3/3/1878.The Treaty of San Stefano ended the war between Russia
and Turkey. Bulgaria, Russia’s
ally, was enlarged to include much of Thrace and Macedonia, with ports on the
Black Sea and Aegean. Britain objected.The arrival of a British fleet on 15/2/1878 as the Russians stood at the
gates of Istanbul persuaded the Russians to makepeace. Russia
and Britain were now on the brink of war.

15/2/1878.A British fleet arrived at Istanbul in
support of the faltering Ottoman Empire.
An earlier decision to send a fleet had been reversed in January 1878.

8/2/1878.Britain dispatched a fleet to
Constantinople. A Conference concerning the growth of Russian influence in
the Balkans and the waning of Turkish power there had broken down without
agreement. In the summer of 1877
war broke out between Russia and Turkey. Britain
was concerned that if Russia advanced to the Bosphorus, British interests in
the Mediterranean would be threatened so she intervened in favour of Turkey.

2/2/1878, Greece declared war on Turkey.

31/1/1878.Following the capture of Plevna (see
15/1/1877), and also Plovdiv and Adrianople, the Russians closed in on
Istanbul. The Ottoman Turks opened truce negotiations at Adrianople.

25/1/1878, The first torpedo was fired
in warfare; a Russian boat sank a Turkish steamer.

24/4/1877, After the
Turkish Parliament had met on 19/3/1877 and rejected Russian demands, Russia
declared war on Turkey.

18/11/1877. In the Caucasus, Russia captured
the fortress of Kars from Ottoman Turkey.

15/1/1877.Russia and Austria agreed that Austria was to be
neutral in any war in the Balkans between Turkey and Russia. The two states rejected the idea of a
Slav state in the Balkans. Russia declared war on Turkey on 24/4/1877.
Rumania entered the war on the side of Russia in May 1877 and a joint
Russian/Rumanian army laid siege to the Bulgarian town of Plevna. The Turks in Plevna surrendered in December
1877. See 31/1/1878.

31/10/1876.Under
pressure from Russia, Turkey agreed to
an armistice with Serbia and Montenegro.

9/8/1876.The Turks
invaded Serbia and defeated the Serbs
at Aleksinac. On 1/9/1876 the Turks again defeated the Serbs at Akleksinac.

1/7/1876Montenegro
also declared war on Turkey.

30/6/1876.Serbia
declared war on Ottoman Turkey.

30/5/1876, Abdul Aziz, 32nd Sultan of Ottoman
Turkey, born 9/2/1830, was forced to
abdicate. Succeeding his brother, Abdul Mejid, in 1861, he promised economic and political reform, but instead wasted money on personal
luxuries and grand building projects. Insurrections occurred in Bulgaria,
Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1875. He was assassinated
on 3/6/1876.

31/1/1876, The ‘Andrassy
Note’ (see 30/12/1875) was handed to the Ottoman Sultan in
Constantinople.The Sultan promised, but
did nothing.

30/12/1875, Russia,
Germany, and Austro-Hungary agreed on the terms of a note to Constantinople calling for Ottoman Turkey to deliver on
its promises of equality for Christians with Muslims and measures to protect
Christians in the Balkans from persecution.This was the so-called ‘Andrassy
Note’, see 31/1/1876.

16/9/1875. Following the anti-Turkish
uprising in Bosnia and Hercegovina on 29/7/1875, the Bulgarians rebelled against the Turks, led by Khristo Botev, in Stara Zagora.

14/6/1873. King Priam’s treasure of 8,7000 priceless
pieces was discovered in Turkey by the German – American Heinrich Schliemann. In
disinterring this treasure he destroyed what was left of ancient Troy.

1870, Heinrich Schliemann began
excavating the site of ancient Troy.

2/8/1868, Constantine, King of the Hellenes, was born in
Athens (died 11/1/1923 of a brain haemorrhage in Palermo).

26/7/1867.King Otto I of Greece died.

18/6/1867, Turkey passed a law allowing, for the first time,
foreigners to own land within Turkey, except in Hejaz.

29/10/1864, The Greek Constitution was adopted. It provided
for a single-House Assembly elected by universal male suffrage. In 1911 a
second Chamber was added.

23/8/1864, Eleutherios Venizelos, Greek politician, was born in Crete.

6/6/1864, King George of Greece entered the Ionian Islands. They had been
ceded by Britain to Greece.

4/6/1863 A protocol between Britain, France, and Russia
provided for the incorporation of the Ionian
Islands with Greece.

1862, King Otto I, King of Greece,
second son of Louis
of Bavaria, abdicated. He had been elected King in 1832. However his
pro-German policies caused disputes. He spent the latter part of his life in
Munich.

25/6/1861, Sultan Abdul Mejid died. Born 23/4/1823, he
succeeded his father, Mahmud II, as Ottoman ruler in 1839. The Ottomans
had then just been defeated by the Egyptians at the Battle of Nisib under Ibrahim Pasha
and they would have advanced to take Constantinople, where they had
sympathisers, had Europe not intervened.

9/6/1861, Turkey
agreed with the French that Lebanon was to have autonomy, under a Christian
Governor to be appointed with the consent of both European Powers and Turkey.

28/2/1857.British and French
troops ended their occupation of Piraeus,
which began on 26/5/1854.

18/2/1856, Abdul Mejid, the Ottoman Sultan, issued the
Hatt-i-Humayun Edict. This guaranteed full civic rights for his Christian
subjects, abolished torture and reformed prisons. These reforms were
effectively forced upon the Sultan by the western European Allies.

26/5/1854.Franco-British
forces occupied the port of Piraeus
to prevent Greece from joining theCrimean
War with Russia against Turkey. See 28/2/1857.

27/3/1854. Crimean Warbegan; Britain and France declared war on Russia.On 12/3/1854 the British and French formally
allied with Turkey. See 30/11/1853. The ostensible cause of the Crimean War was
a dispute between Russia, France, and Turkey over control of the Christian Holy
Places in Turkish-controlled Palestine. The Turks refused Russia’s demands and
Russia marched into the Turkish vassal states of Wallachia and Serbia. This
threatened Russian occupation of Istanbul and hence Britain’s communications
with its Indian Empire, so Britain entered the war against Russia.

20/3/1854, Russia sent troops southwards across the Danube,
threatening Ottoman Turkey. Ultimately this posed the threat of Russia on the
Mediterranean, putting communications between Britain and India at risk, and so
was unacceptable to the UK.

12/3/1854,
Britain and France made an alliance with Ottoman Turkey.

3/1/1854, An Anglo-French squadron entered the Black Sea, and
insisted that the Russian fleet withdraw from attacking Turkey.

30/11/1853.The Russians destroyed a Turkish fleet at Sinope. On
3/1/1854 British and French fleets entered the Black Sea to protect Ottoman
Turkish coasts and shipping. See 4/10/1853, and 23/3/1854.

4/10/1853.The Russians
refused to withdraw from the Danubian Principalities, and Turkey
declared war on Russia. On 23/10/1853 the Turks, under Omar Pasha, crossed the Danube
into Wallachia. See 30/11/1853.

13/7/1841, The Straits Convention, signed by the five
great European powers, guaranteed Ottoman sovereignty and closed the Bosporus
and Dardanelles to all foreign warships. This
was directed at preventing Russian expansion.

1/6/1841, Mehmet Ali became hereditary Viceroy of Egypt.

13/2/1841, The Ottoman
Sultan issued a decree confirmingMehemet Alias ruler of Egypt, also Nubia and Darfur.

27/11/1840, Under the
Convention of Alexandria, drawn up by Napier, Mohammed Ali of Egypt agreed to
return the Ottoman fleet and renounce claims over Syria, in return for
hereditary rule over Egypt.

3/11/1840, Acre was taken by
British forces.

10/10/1840, Beirut fell to
British forces. The French decided not to support Mehmet Ali of Egypt.

6/10/1840.France, Britain, and Russia
entered the war between Turkey and Egypt on Turkey’s
side. They occupied the
Syria-Palestine coastland to cut off the Egyptian Pasha from the route to
Anatolia. On 4/11/1840 the British fleet bombarded the ports of Beirut and Acre.

9/9/1840, British gunboats
bombarded Beirut and landed troops there.

15/7/1840, The Treaty of London. Britain, Austria, Prussia and Russia agreed to
form a military alliance against Egypt, which was being pressured to give up
the Ottoman fleet it held, and abandon claims on northern Syria, Medina, Mecca
and Crete.

3/10/1839, Beirut fell to the French, and Ibrahim, surrounded by a hostile population
and cut off by sea, retreated hurriedly.

11/8/1839, The French fleet
appeared off Beirut, hostile toIbrahim,
and this encouraged a revolt by the Syrians against the tyranny of
Ibrahim.See 3/10/1839.

1/7/1839, Mahmud II, Sultan of Turkey, died, aged 54. He had been
poisoned, after his fleet surrendered to
Egypt at Alexandria.He was
succeeded by his 16-year-old son, Adbul Mejid I.

24/6/1839.The Ottoman Sultan, Mahmud II,
launched another offensive against Mohammed Ali, the pasha of Egypt. However
this day at the Battle of Nezib
Egyptian forces under Ibrahim Pasha defeated the Ottomans. The
battle took place near the present day Turkish-Syrian border.

21/4/1839, A revolt against Mehemet Ali of
Egypt began in Hauran, Arabia.The Ottoman Army invaded Syria, only to be heavily defeated by Ibrahim
at Nezib.

1/6/1835, Otto I assumed the Kingship of Greece.

8/7/1833.Turkey,
by signing the Treaty of Unkiar-Skelessi, gave Russia the right to close the Dardanelles Straits in times of war.

27/5/1833, See 1/11/1831, Mehemet Ali of
Egypt captured the Ottoman garrison of Acre.

4/5/1833.A peace treaty
between Turkey and Egypt gave Egypt the territories of Syria and Cilicia,
ending the war between them that began in 1832, see 21/12/1832.

20/2/1833, At Constantinople’s invitation, a Russian squadron
entered the Bosphorus.The
Russians had promised to protect the Ottoman capital against Mehemet of
Egypt and Russia got to be
effective gatekeeper of the entrance to the Black Sea.The
western European powers had procrastinated about helping Constantinople, whilst
Russia had come up with concrete assistance.

23/12/1832, Mehemet Ali of Egypt continued to advance towards
Constantinople, defeating the Turks at
Konia.

21/12/1832.Russia offered military assistance to Turkey against
Egyptian forces who were 50 miles from Istanbul. The
Egyptians had invaded Turkish lands
after Turkey broke a promise to give Syria to Egypt in return for help
during the Greek war of Independence. See 4/5/1833.

1/8/1832, Ibrahim Pasha captured the city of Antioch from Ottoman Turkey during the Syrian War.

9/7/1832, Mehmet Ali crushed an Ottoman Army at Homs, and on 17/7/1833
defeated the main Ottoman Army at the Pass of Beilan.

15/6/1832, Mehemet Ali captured Damascus.

7/5/1832, Greece was
proclaimed an independent kingdom, with Otto I as King. Britain, France and Russia guaranteed protection.

1/11/1831, Mehemet Ali, Pasha of Egypt, began a revolt against Sultam Mahmud, Ottoman ruler in Constantinople.Mehemet had
helped to suppress initial rebellions by the Greeks in Morea (southern Greece)
but now feared that Constantinople would not reward but dispose of him.On this day Mehemet entered Syria and began a
siege of the Ottoman garrison in Acre.See 27/5/1833.

3/2/1830.At the London
conference, Britain, France, and Russia
guaranteed Greek independence as a kingdom, under the Protocol of London.

27/9/1829, Mount Ararat was first climbed.

14/9/1829.The Treaty of Adrianople preserved the Ottoman
Empire. Reeling under a series of defeats, the Turks faced occupation of
Istanbul by the Russians; they held back from this for fear of destroying the
Turkish Empire entirely and starting
another European War. The Turks retained nominal sovereignty over Wallachia
and Moldavia, but Russia has the real power here. Europeans grew anxious over
the growing power of Russia.

11/6/1829.The Russians
defeated the Turks at the Battle of
Kulecheva, opening up a route to the Balkan Mountains.

22/3/1829.At a conference in
London, the boundaries of the
independent state of Greece were agreed, after nearly 400 years of Ottoman
rule.

26/4/1828.In support of
the Greek struggle for independence, Russia
declared war on the Ottoman Empire.
On 8/6/1828 the Russians crossed the Danube, and took Varna on 12/10/1829.

20/10/1827. In response to
the rebuffed ultimatum of 6/7/1827, British, French, and Russian forces destroyed
the Turkish fleet at the Battle of Navarino. Over 50 Turkish and
Egyptian ships were sunk.

6/7/1827.At the Treaty
of London, France, Britain, and Russia threatened to use force against
Turkey if the Ottoman Empire did not agree to an armistice with Greece. In
August 1827 the Turks refused this. See 20/10/1827.

5/6/1827.Athens
was captured by the Ottoman Turks.

16/6/1826, The insurrection of the Janissaries in Istanbul ended.

10/6/1826, The final revolt of the Janissaries in Turkey began. They
objected to the formation of a new military corps to replace them, by Mahmud.

23/4/1826, The Turks captured Missolonghi.

5/4/1826, Russia
demanded the cessation of Ottoman military operations on the Danube.

19/4/1824,Lord Byron died at sunset of marsh fever (malaria) at
Missolonghi, helping the Greeks during
their struggle for independence from Ottoman Turkey; he was 36. See
22/3/1829.

18/7/1823, The Treaty of Erzerum was signed, between the Sultan of Ottoman Turkey
and the Qajar Shah of Persia; this Treaty defined their common
frontier in lower Iraq. However the two powers continued to dispute possession
of the town of Muhammara, at the mouth of the Karun River, a disagreement
dating from 1812. In 1847 a second Treaty of Erzerum was signed, giving
Muhammara to Persia.

23/4/1823,
Sultan Adbul Mejid was born, see 25/6/1861.

25/3/1823, Britain recognised the Greek insurgents as a
belligerent party.This was despite fears that the Greek
rebellion would spark another Turkish-Russian war.

19/6/1822.The Greeks under Constantine Kanarisdestroyed an Ottoman Turkish fleet. A
large Ottoman army invaded Greece in July 1822. In January 1823 the Ottomans
failed to capture the key fort of Missolonghi at the entrance to the Gulf of
Corinth and were forced to withdraw.

13/1/1822.Greek rebels
proclaimed independence from the Ottoman Turks at Epirus.

19/6/1821, At the Battle of Dragashani, a Greek uprising
against Turkish rule was defeated.

2/4/1821, The Greeks
under Turkish rule began a revolt under Archbishop
Germanos of Patras.The Greek population rose en masse, captured
the capital of the Morea Peninsula, Tripolitza, and the revolt then spread
north, and to the Greek Islands. These
islands were the main recruiting ground of the Ottoman Navy, so Turkish sea
power was weakened.

5/11/1815, By Treaty, Britain gained the Ionian Islands,
including Corfu.

1/6/1815, Otto I, King of Greece, was born.

12/5/1812,A peace treaty was signed between Russia and Turkey.

5/6/1809, A peace treaty was signed in Chanak between
England and Turkey.

28/5/1807, Ottoman Sultan Selim III was deposed by the
Janissaries. He was succeeded by the son of Sultan Abdul Hamid.

9/1/1792, Russia and Turkey
signed the Peace of Jassy.

8/1/1792.The Ottoman Turks bowed to the inevitable
and accepted Catherine
the Great’s Russian sovereignty over Georgia. Britain feared further Russian expansion in the Black Sea as this
could threaten British Mediterranean interests.

7/4/1791, Selim III (1761-1808) became Sultan of Ottoman
Turkey.

16/7/1774.The Russians and Turks signed the Treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardji, ending their six-year war.
Moldavia and Wallachia were returned to Turkey and the Crimea became independent.
Russia gained control of much of the northern Black Sea coast. The Sultan was
allowed to remain spiritual leader of the Crimean Moslems; however Russia
gained the right to build and protect an orthodox church in Istanbul. This gave Russia a pretext to intervene in
Turkish internal affairs.

17/9/1730, The
Ottoman Grand Vizier was strangled in a revolt by the Janissaries. Sultan Ahmed
III (1673-1730) was forced to abdicate, having suffered serious
defeats by the Austrians.

21/7/1718, The Peace of Passarowitz ended the conflict between the Ottoman Empire and
the Holy Roman Empire.The position of
the two Empires was stabilised in the Balkans until well into the nineteenth
century.

23/8/1703, Ottoman Sultan Mustafa III
was deposed.

13/6/1700, Peter the Great concluded a
peace with Turkey.

26/1/1699, Prince Eugene, having invaded Serbia and Bosnia, forced the Turks to
conclude the Peace of Carlowitz.This restored the entire Kingdom of Hungary, with the exception of the
Banat of Temesvar, to Austria from Turkey.This was the start of the rise to
power of the Hapsburg Dynasty.

16/11/1698, A congress began in
Sremski Karlovici to discuss an end to
the war between The Ottoman Empire and the Holy Roman Empire.

11/9/1697, At the Battle
of Zenta, Prince
Eugene of Savoy, leading an Austrian
army, defeated the Ottomans under Mustafa II,
see 26/1/1699.

22/8/1696, Forces of Venice and Turkey fought near Molino.

1695, Ottoman SultanAhmed II
died (born 1642, acceded 1691, succeeding his brother Suleiman II). He was defeated by
the Austrians at Slankamen
(20/8/1691), which denied possession of Hungary to the Ottomans, This battle
established the Danube as the boundary between Austria and Ottoman Turkey.

8/10/1690. Belgrade
was retaken by the Ottoman Turks.

26/9/1687. The Parthenon and the
Propylea were destroyed when the Venetians bombarded Athens. The Venetian army was
besieging the Turks when a mortar bomb fired by the Venetians set off Turkish
gunpowder stored in the Acropolis.

11/9/1683. The conquering armies of Islam under Vizier Kara Mustafa were defeated at the gates of
Vienna. The Turks had been besieging Vienna since July 1683. Relief came
under Poland’s King
John III and Charles, Duke of Normandy. The Ottoman Sultan
ordered Mustafa
to commit suicide.

7/9/1683, German
reinforcements arrived outside the besieged city of Vienna.

31/7/1683, Invading Turkish forces reached the gates of Vienna.If Vienna fell, Germany would be open to a
Turkish invasion.

27/9/1669.Candia, the capital of Crete,
was captured by the Ottoman Turks
from the Venetians after a 21 year
siege. Spain, Britain, France, the Pope, Tuscany, and Malta, had all supplied
troops to the Venetians but to no avail. Towards the end the Ottoman Turks intensified the blockade and disagreements broke out
between the allies leading to the withdrawal of some of the Europeans.

1/8/1664. The Ottoman
Turkish advance into Austria was halted by Hapsburg (Austrian)
defences at the Battle of St Gotthard.

13/5/1654. The Battle of the Dardanelles took place. The
Venetian navy defeated Turkish forces.

8/8/1648, In
Constantinople, the Janissaries deposed Sultan Ibrahim after he ordered the lifting of
the siege of Candia
(Heraklion), Crete. On 18/8/1648 Ibrahim was strangled by his own executioner
and replaced by his eldest son, 9-year old Mohammed IV.

20/5/1622, Ottoman
Sultan Osman
II was murdered.

1617, Ottoman Sultan Ahmed I died (born 1590, acceded 1603).
He fought a long and losing war against Persia, 1602-12.

12/12/1574, Selim II, Sultan of Turkey, died, aged 50. He was succeeded by
his eldest son, 27-year old Murad III, who had his brothers strangled in
his presence.

7/3/1573. Venice concluded a peace with the Turks by which Venice
recognised Turkey’s sovereignty over Cyprus.

7/10/1571.The Ottoman Turkish fleet under Ali Pasha was defeated by the navies of Spain,
Venice, and the Pope at the Battle of Lepanto, in the Gulf of Corinth. Christendom was concerned at the fall of Cyprus to
Turkey, under Selim II, Suleiman the Great’s successor. This was the last battle fought between
galleys. The Turks used ramming tactics, but allied ships used firepower to
defeat the Turks. Although Ottoman
Turkey retained control of Cyprus, its western expansion in the Mediterranean
was halted. The Ottomans lost 230 galleys to the Christians 17.

6/9/1566.Suleiman the
Magnificent, leader of the Ottoman Empire for 46 years, died. He had brought the OttomanEmpire to the peak of its power, ruling an area from Hungary to Mesopotamia,
and promoting justice and culture. His eldest surviving son, the incompetent
drunkard Selim,
succeeded him. All other potential rivals had been eliminated by intrigue and
murder.

8/9/1565, The Great
Siege of Malta was raised.

18/5/1565. The Ottoman Turks arrived at Malta to try
and capture it, see 21/12/1522. However
the island held out until relieved by a Christian fleet from Sicily arrived in
September 1565. Casualties had been heavy for both the Turks and the
Maltese; however the Turks had been riven by disputes between their naval and
army commanders. The Turks returned to Istanbul, their hopes of dominating the western Mediterranean dashed.

28/9/1538, At the Battle
of Preveza, the Turkish fleet
under Suleiman
the Magnificent, commanded by Barbarossa Hayreddin Pasha, defeated the Holy
League forces of Charles V, commanded by Andrea Doria.

24/2/1538, The Treaty
of Nagyvarad; peace was declared between King Ferdinand and the Turks.John
Zapolya was recognised as King of Hungary, whilst Ferdinand
retained northern and western Hungary and was recognised as heir to the
Hungarian throne.

31/12/1534.The Ottoman
army captured Baghdad. By 1546 they controlled
Yemen, gateway to the Red Sea.

13/7/1534.Ottoman armies captured Tabriz in north western Persia.

25/6/1532, Suleiman I attempted another invasion of
Hungary, but failed.

15/10/1529. The Ottoman Turks withdrew from their siege of Vienna, as winter approached.

27/5/1529, Ad-Din Barbarossa completed his conquest of Algeria,
bringing the Ottoman Empire to its
peak.

10/5/1529, The Turkish
Army under Suleiman
I left Constantinople to invade Hungary.

29/8/1526, The Battle
of Mohacs.The Turkish army under Suleiman I
defeated the Hungarians under King Loius II,
who was killed whilst retreating.Suleiman
took Buda, whilst Archduke Ferdinand of
Austria and John Zapolya, Prince of Transylvania, disputed over the
succession. As a result of this dispute, Dubrovnik
achieved independence, although it recognised Turkish overlordship. The
Hapsburgs now ruled Bohemia and Hungary.

21/12/1522.Rhodes, formerly the base of the Knights of St John, was conquered
by the OttomanTurks, led by Suleiman, after a six-month siege.The Knights of St John, driven out of Rhodes,
were given permission by Emperor Charles V in 1530 to settle in Malta.See 18/5/1565.

18/12/1522, The Turks finally
broke into Rhodes, but the Knights continued fierce resistance in the streets.

28/7/1522, OttomanSultan Suleiman
I began a siege of the Knights of St. John in Rhodes.

21/9/1520, OttomanSultan Selim
died, aged 53. He was succeeded by his 24-year old son, Suleiman I (The Magnificent).

29/5/1453. The Turks
conquered Constantinople, following
a siege of over a year. The end of the Byzantine Empire.

17/10/1448, Battle of Kosovo: Hungarian forces under John Hunyadi
were defeated by the Turks.

27/10/1439. Death of King Albert II of Hungary at Langendorf. He reigned
less than two years and spent this in the defence of Hungary against the
Turks.

21/7/1402, The Ottoman Turks were decisively defeated by Timur at the Battle of Ankara. The Ottomans lost
control of Anatolia. However
they had expanded territorially into Europe, and were able to recover Anatolia
after Timur departed.

17/7/1394, Turkish
troops took Trnovo, a town in Bulgaria 124 miles ENE of Sofia.

15/6/1389.Serbia was
crushed by the Ottoman Turks. At a
battle in Kosovo, at the ‘field of the
blackbirds’, the entire Serbian nobility was wiped out. The Ottomans had already invaded Bulgaria.

1353, Ottoman Turkey seized
Gallipoli, on the European side of the Dardanelles.

6/4/1326. Orhan, son of Osman, the founder of theOttoman Empire, captured Brusa from the
Byzantines and made it his capital. By 1341 Orkhan had reinforced his influence
in the Byzantine Empire by marrying twice into it;
first to Theodora,
daughter of Byzantium’s new joint Emperor John
Cantacuzene, whom he had lent 6,000 troops for his coup. Secondly,
Orkhan’s new sister in law, Helen, married the other joint Emperor and coup
victim, John
Paleologus.

3/9/1260, The Mamluks defeated the Mongols at the Battle of Ain Jalut (Goliath’s
Spring) in Galilee, marking their first decisive defeat and the point of
maximum expansion of the Mongol Empire. Damascus had fallen to the Mongols in
1259 and Hulegu,
Mongol leader, now turned on Egypt, the major military power in the region. The
Mongols now ruled an area from the Pacific to the Mediterranean, The Mameluke
rulers of Egypt responded to Hulegu’s demands for capitulation by killing Hulegu’s
envoys and marching into Palestine to fight. Mameluke cavalry was crucial in the Mongol defeat.

23/8/1244.Jerusalem was taken by a mercenary force of
Turks. On 17/12/1244 the Turks joined with Egypt in routing the Latins at Gaza.

26/6/1243. The Mongols routed the Seljuk Turkish army.

1221, Sultan Osman I acceded as
Ottoman ruler.

1071, At the Battle of Manzikert, an army of
Seljuk Turks under King Alp Arslan heavily defeated a Byzantine Army twice its
size. This heralded the push into Anatolia by Seljuk Turks, whose successors,
the Ottomans, took Constantinople in 1453. Arslan then set his aims
on conquering lands to the south, towards Baghdad and Damascus.

191 BCE, Roman forces routed Antiochis III
at Thermopylae.

192 BCE, Syrian forces under Antiochus III
invaded Greece at the invitation of the Aetolians.

197 BCE, At the Battle of Cynoscephalae in
Thessaly, the Romans under T Quinctius Flaminius defeated the Macedonians
under Philip
V. The Romans forced Philip V to surrender Greece to Rome, reduce
his army to 5,00 men and his navy to five ships, promise not to make war
without Rome’s permission, and to pay Rome 1,000 talents over ten years.

17/7/268 BCE, Death of Arsinoe II, Queen of Macedonia
and Thebes, in Egypt.

315 BCE, the
Macedonian port city of Thessalonica was founded by Cassander. It was named after
his wife, whom her father, Philip II of Macedon, had named Thessaloniki
to commemorate his victory (Niki) over Thessaly in 2/8/338 BCE.

13/6/323 BCE. Alexander
the Great died, of a fever, at
Babylon; he
was just 32 years old.. His body was taken to Alexandria, but the location of
his grave is unknown. His son, born to Alexander’s wife Roxana in August 332 BCE, was
killed in 310 BCE by one of the Generals competing for Alexander’s Empire.

30/1/330 BCE, After gaining the Pass of
the Persian Gates, Alexander entered Persepolis. There he ceremonially burnt down the palace of Xerxes I,
as a symbol that the Panhellenic war of revenge was at an end

2/8/338
BCE, Philip of Macedon
defeated an Athenian-Theban alliance at the Battle of Chaeronea, so ending the
last Greek struggle for independence.

25/4/404 BCE, Athens, under starvation from siege, capitulated to Spartan forces, so ending the Peleponnesian Wars. The Spartans allowed Athens to
retain some autonomy, as Theramenes secured terms that saved the city from
destruction. The walls of Athens were demolished. Alcibiades was murdered in
Phyrgia at the request of Sparta.

9/405 BCE, The Spartan General Lysander captured the Athenian fleet without
resistance in September; just 25 ships escaped under the command of Conon.
Meanwhile the Spartan King Pausanius laid siege to Athens, and Lysander’s
fleet blockaded Piraeus. In Athens, Cleophon was executed and Athens endured
severe food shortages for 6 months as the siege progressed. Corinth and Thebes
demanded the total destruction of the city.

8/406 BCE, Alcibiades
was replaced by a Board of Governors. An Athenian fleet was blockaded in
Mitylene harbour by a Spartan fleet under Callicratidas. Atgens sent a larghe
fleet to relieve Mitylene, and Callicratidas was drowned in August at the
Battle of Arginusae. Sparta again attemnpted to negotiate peace with Cleophon
and again Cleophon spurned them.

407 BCE, The Spartan General Lysander refused to be lured out of
the port of Ephesus to do battle with Alcibiades, who then ran low on supplies and
had to sail north to plunder enemy towns. Alcibiades left a squadron at Ephesus under
the command of his boyhood friend, Antiochus; however Antiochus, against orders,
taunted Lysander;
provoking the Spartans to sail out and rout the Athenian fleet at Notium. This
gave the enemies of Alcibiades in Athens a chance to strip him of
his command.

16/6/408 BCE, Alcibiades entered Athens in
triumph after seven years absence. He was appointed General, woth autocratic
powers, and then left for Samos to rejoin his fleet. Meanwhile, however, the
Spartan Admiral
Lysander arrived in Ephesus and began to build up a huge fleet with
assistance from the new Persian satrap, Cyrus.

409 BCE, Alcibiades
recaptured Byzantium (which had frebelled against Athens). This opened up a
supply route for grain to Athens from the Euxine (Black) Sea, through the
Bosphorus.

410 BCE, A Spartan army, with its Persian land army reinforcements, was
heavily defeated by Alcibiades at Cyzicus on the Sea of Marmora.
Sparta attempted to negotiate an end to hostilities with the Athenian ruler, Cleophon,
but Cleophon
passed the opportunity by.

411 BCE, The Athenian democratic government was overthrown in a revolt by the
oligarchs Antiphon,
Peisander
and Phrynichus,
who then opened treasonous negotiations with Sparta. However these oligarchs
were themselves deposed by the moderate Theramenes, who then recalled Alcibiades
from Sardis, who was elected ruler of Athens.

9/411 BCE, A Spartan fleet in the Hellespont at Cynossema was defeated by
Athens.

412 BCE, Alcibiades
fell out with King
Agis and retired to the court of the Persian Satrap, Tissaphernes.
He urged Tissaphernes
to withdraw his support for Sparta. Other Spartan allied cities broke away in a
series of revolts.

9/413 BCE, The Athenian fleet was destroyed in the Battle of Syracuse; Demosthenes
and Nicias
were executed. The foot soldiers fled into the hills; many were captured and
died as slaves in the stoine quarries.

27/8/413 BCE, A lunar eclipse aroused
superstitious fears amongst the Athenians occupying Syracuse and Demosthenes
and Nicias
decide to remain in the city.

7/413 BCE, Demosthenes’
fleet arrived at Syracuse but was attacked by night and suffered heavy losses. Demosthenes
urged Nicias
to evacuate his forces.

414 BCE, Athens captured Syracuse and fortified it by land and sea. However
(commnded by Nicias)
the Athenians ran short of supplies; meanwhile Sparta reinforced the Syrausans.
Athens sent out a supply fleet of 73 ships under Demosthenes.

11/415 BCE, Athenian forces landed at Dascom, near Syracuse, but their victory
was of little use.

22/5/415 BCE, A bad omen in Athens; the
Hermae Statues were found to be mysteriously damaged. Despite this bad omen,
Athens starts its plan to conquer Sicily. Whilst away in Sicily, Alcibiades
was recalled for trial in Athens; instead he defected to Sparta, and was sentenced
to death in absentia.

416 BCE, Alcibiades
urged Athenians to conquer Syracuse, Carthage and Sicily, so gaimnignextra
resources in order to crush Sparta.

417 BCE, Athenian forces were defeated at Chalcidice.

8/418 BCE, Battle of Bantinea. The
largest battle in the Peloponnesian Wars; Sparta won a major victory over
Argos, which had broken its treaty with King Agis.

419 BCE, King
Agis of Sparta gathered an army at Philus and attacked Argos, with
his Boetian allies. The Boetian forces proved to be weak, but Agis
managed to conclude a treaty with Argos.

11/4/421 BCE, The Peace of Nicias
temporarily halted the Peloponnesian War.
Alcibades, however, then set up an anti-Sparta alliance between Athens and the
democracies of Argos, Mantinea and Elis. Sparta then allied with Corinth and
Boetia.

431 BCE, The Peleponnesian War began,
between Athens and Sparta.

430 BCE, Plague devastated
Athens.

438 BCE, In Athens, the Parthenon
was completed, and consecrated, after 9 years of construction.

448 BCE, The Acropolis was rebuilt
under Pericles, repairing the damage done by the Persians in 480 BCE.

28/9/490 BCE. The original Marathon was run by a breathless
messenger who ran 24 miles from the scene of the Battle of Marathon to the city
of Athens. ‘Rejoice, we conquer’ he gasped, the dropped dead. The Athenians had
beaten a huge Persian fleet. Athens then
expanded its own fleet and military power.

527 BCE, Peisistratus died and was succeeded by his sons,
Hippias
and Hipparchus.

546 BCE, Peisistratus regained power for a third time in
Athens; he had the support of Thessaly and also from Lydarnis of Naxos. He
exiuled his opponents, redistributed land to peasants, and encouraged insudtry
and trade.556 BCE, Peisistratus
was removed from power a second time, having split with Megacles. He went on to make a
fortune from his mines in Thrace.

559 BCE, Peisistratus was restored to power with the
support of Megacles.

561 BCE, The Athenian General Peisistratus
made himself dictator, but was then deposed by the city nobility under Lycurgus.
He introduced the cult of Dionysius.

650 BCE, At the 33rd Olympic Games, a new event was added; the pancratium,
a freestyle no-holds-barred comnination of boxing and wrestling.

682 BCE, At the 25th Olympic Games, the first equestrian
even was added. A four-horse chariot race was held at the new Hippodrome.

690 BCE, At the 23rd Olympic Games, boxing was added as an event.

708 BCE, The 18th
Olympic Games. A pentathlon event was now added, comprising a
long jump, a javelin throw, a 200 yard sprint, a discus throw and wrestling,
was added.

720 BCE, A third event was added to the 15th Olympic Games, a 2.5 mile long
distance race of 12 circuits around the stadium.

724 BCE, The 14thOlympic Games. The games now comprised a
second foot race (see 23/7/776 BCE), of 880 yards, twice around the stadium.

750 BCE, First recorded use of Greek alphabet, adapted from Phoenician and
Semitic alphabets.

23/7/776 BCE. The first Olympic Games (see also Sports
for modern Games) opened in Olympia (in some form, the Olympic Games may have
been staged since 1350 BCE). The games, consisting only of a 200 yard foot race
(see 724 BCE), was won by a cook called Coroibos.

6,500 BCE, Copper smelting began at Catal
Huyuk,

7,000 BCE, Estimated date of foundation of Catal
Huyuk, Anatolia, largest Neolithic site in the Near east.